


Shadow of a Doubt

by Raissa_Baiard



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-22
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:33:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22851793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raissa_Baiard/pseuds/Raissa_Baiard
Summary: A year after Kanan joins the Ghost’s crew, he and Hera struggle to define their feelings for each other.
Relationships: Kanan Jarrus/Hera Syndulla
Comments: 9
Kudos: 57





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story was written for TheForce.net Jedi Council Forums fanfic forum's One-Hit Wonder challenge. The song I received was [_Silhouettes_](https://genius.com/The-rays-silhouettes-lyrics) by The Rays (1957).

The blue-skinned Twi’lek sitting across from Hera Syndulla was easily twice her age and was missing the lower third of his right lek, but her eyes sparkled merrily as the two of them chatted. He leaned forward and took one of her hands in his. Whatever he said to Hera made her laugh as she pulled her hand away and wagged a gently remonstrating finger at him. 

Kanan watched them from across the cluster of tables outside the Smiling Tooka Café in Amma city on Barcana while he sipped a cup of caf that had gone cold and bitter. Hera had said she was going to meet a very important contact at the café, that it wouldn’t take long and he should meet her there as soon as the Ghost was refueled. But she’d been talking to the Twi’lek for nearly an hour now, smiling across the table at him and laughing frequently. They did not seem to be discussing business, and Kanan was beginning to feel a bit irritated. Of course, Hera didn’t owe him any explanations; she was the captain and he was just...well, whatever it was he was aboard the Ghost. They’d never formally clarified his job. Whatever his title, it certainly didn’t mean she had to tell him anything about her personal life. Still, if she’d been going out with this disreputable looking Twi’lek instead of meeting a contact, it might have been nice of her to give him a heads up, so he didn’t have to sit here watching them flirt all afternoon. Kanan scowled into his mug and drummed his fingers on the table.

“Bwaah!” Chopper, Hera’s eccentric Clone War-era astromech, who was waiting with him, prodded Kanan in the side with a grasper. “Bwah bwaahbwah bwop.”

“I should tell her?” Kanan frowned. He’d gotten pretty good at understanding the droid’s vocalizations, but he wasn’t sure what Chopper was referring to this time. “Tell her what?” 

His answer did little to clarify things. “How I feel about her? Chopper, what are you talking about?”

“Bwah bwop bwaah bwop!”

“I like her? Of course I like her.” Kanan had been working in his capacity as a jack-of-all-trades on the Ghost for close to a year now, ever since he’d helped Hera thwart the Empire’s plans on Gorse. In that time, he’d come to genuinely respect her for the strength of her convictions. She was a good and honorable woman, kind and caring as well as passionate and fierce. She was an absolutely top-notch pilot. Intelligent. Witty. And beautiful, too, of course...but that was beside the point. “Hera’s an admirable woman What’s not to like?”

“Bwaaah!” It was amazing how much annoyance the droid could express on that one syllable. “Bwah bwop bwahbwah bwop!”

“Then what did you mean?

“Bwah BWAAAH bwop!” The last “bwop” trailed off into an electronic smooching sound.

“What?!” Kanan fumbled with his caf mug, nearly dropping it. “No! I can’t… I mean, I don’t!” The droid was crazy. Just because Kanan liked Hera didn’t mean he liked Hera. They were colleagues. Friends. They made a great team. Nothing more. He didn’t need to be more, even if Hera was an amazing and attractive woman. 

Chopper snorted and poked Kanan in the ribs again, harder this time. “Bwahahaha! Bwah b’bwah bwahbwah bwop!”

“The way I’m watching her? I’m watching Hera so I’ll know when she’s ready to leave. I am not staring.” Did mind tricks work on droids? Was there an off switch somewhere on the back of that flattened orange dome? There had to be some way to stop that evil electronic chuckling. Kanan stabbed a finger at the doid. “You’re delusional, you know that? When was the last time Hera had your circuits wiped?” Chopper gave an affronted “BWWWAAH!” and his electroshock probe suddenly arced with crackling blue sparks, zapping Kanan’s outstretched hand. He winced and twitched as all his muscles seem to spasm at once. “Ow! Why you maladjusted—”

“You boys look like you’ve been having fun without me.” Hera had apparently finished her meeting or date or whatever she wanted to call it while Kanan had been arguing with Chopper. She motioned for them to follow her.

Kanan rubbed his stinging arm as he rose; behind him, the droid snickered quietly. “And you looked like you were enjoying yourself.” 

“It was good to see Nawwaf again.” Hera answered with a smile as they made their way down the narrow, winding avenue that led from Amma’s merchant quarter back to the spaceport. “It’s been a long time since I’ve talked to him.”

“A special friend?” 

“An old friend...of my father’s.” She tilted her head to the side and raised an eyebrow at Kanan. “Why? Would it matter to you if he was?”

“What?” Kanan’s steps faltered. “No! No, of course not. You and I just work together. Why should it bother me if…” He smothered another scowl. First Chopper and now Hera. Why would either of them have these silly, unfounded suspicions? All right, so he’d been attracted to her to begin with, but their friendship had moved past that. She’d made it clear when he signed on that she wasn’t looking for that kind of companionship from him. And that was fine. “Anyway, you don’t have to worry about me. Jedi don’t form those kind of attachments.”

Her eyebrows arched a little higher. “Those kind of attachments?” 

“Yes, you know…” What was that phrase? “Romantic entanglements. Emotional involvement leads to possessive feelings and jealousy. It clouds one’s judgement, so we’re instructed to avoid it.” 

“Entanglements.” Now Hera stopped, and there was an odd note to her voice he couldn’t quite place. Her mouth thinned out into a line the way it did when she discovered the Ghost’s navicomputer had developed another new quirk. “I see. Well, thank you for explaining that to me. I feel so much better now.” She gave her head a quick shake, lekku twitching, and Kanan thought she sighed a bit as she started walking again. “At any rate, Nawwaf had some interesting intel for us. Feel like doing some surveillance work tonight?”

“Sure,” Kanan replied, glad to move on to a topic that wasn’t as discomfiting. Though why discussing attachments with Hera should make him feel as mixed up inside as a youngling learning the Code, he didn’t know. “What have we got?”

“According to Nawwaf, Moff Ramier has been meeting frequently with a woman named Adila Zamin, a member of a crime syndicate called ‘Eighty-seven’.” Hera’s lips curved up into the smile that meant she was going to make trouble for the Empire—and enjoy every moment of it. “I’d be curious to know what the good Moff is discussing with ryll smugglers, wouldn’t you?”

“Absolutely.” And Kanan would enjoy every moment, too. Hera could make trouble for the Empire like no one else; the subtlety with which she worked was a thing of beauty.

Her smile broadened as they approached the Ghost. “Good! Dinner in the galley in half an hour. We’ll make our plans then.”


	2. Chapter 2

Cooking was one of Hera’s particular tasks aboard the _Ghost_. She’d tried splitting the responsibility with Kanan when he joined the crew, but his culinary efforts had been...interesting, where “interesting” meant undercooked, overspiced, and generally inedible. As captain, she’d made the executive decision to take him off the cooking rotation and put him on permanent clean-up detail instead. Fortunately, Kanan had plenty of other skills to his credit. He was equally handy with a blaster and a hydrospanner. He was shrewd when it came to planning incursions against the Empire, but he never shirked from doing manual labor like loading cargo. If only he weren’t so infuriatingly otherworldly when he lapsed into Jedi-speak. 

Hera set a pot of water on the tiny cooktop to heat while Chopper, who could never stay out from underfoot, fiddled with the controls to get the temperature to a precise boil. She decided to make a mushroom sauce to add some flavor to the otherwise anemic freeze-dried noodles, and retrieved a small carton of cantarells from the conservator. “Kanan was certainly in an interesting mood this afternoon with all his talk of ‘entanglements’,” she commented, as she selected a knife and began to slice them. 

Chopper swiveled his dome towards her. “Bwaah b’bwah bwah bwop.”

“What do you mean I should tell Kanan how I feel about him?” Hera paused, knife poised over a mushroom, and frowned. How she felt about Kanan? She had a bad feeling she knew where this was going. “What makes you think I have feelings for him?” 

“Bwah b’bwah bwaahbwah bwop bwaah bwa’bwah!” 

The knife fell out of her hand and hit the counter with a clatter. “I most certainly do not look at him like a lovesick tooka!” Astromechs weren’t supposed to have the capacity for imagination or creativity, so how was Chopper coming up with such a preposterous image? Hera felt the heat rise to her cheeks and her lekku writhed of their own accord. Her father would say this was what came of not performing routine memory wipes on one’s droids. 

“Bwaah!” Chopper insisted. “Bwah _bwop_ bwah!” 

“No, I do not!” She turned away from him and busied herself chopping the mushrooms, the knife rising and falling with a series of rapid snicks. ”I admit, I like Kanan more than I thought I would. He’s turned out to be a great help to me.” Kanan had seemed to be little more than a cynical loner when she’d first met him, but Hera understood now that it was a persona he’d adopted to protect himself. Once he’d learned that there were still beings he could trust, that streetwise veneer had peeled away, revealing a truly principled man underneath. Hera had learned to trust him, too, and to rely on him. He’d become more than just a member of her crew; he was a true partner and a good friend— but that was all he could ever be. “Anyway, you heard him.” Hera twisted her mouth into an approximation of Kanan’s scowl and made her voice low and mocking. “‘Jedi don’t form romantic entanglements; we’re above that sort of thing.’ So even if I _had_ feelings for him, which I _do not_ …. Oh, why am I arguing with you about this?!” She threw down her knife at the sound of Chopper’s derisive snort, and whirled around, jabbing an emphatic finger towards the galley door. “Just go make sure your sensor dish is calibrated for tonight!”

“BWAAAH!” Chopper threw up his graspers and rolled out of the galley, muttering about stubborn, illogical organics who could never say what they really meant. 

Hera scowled. Impossible droid! Chopper had been with her since she was a little girl, and probably knew her better than anyone, even her own father, but he could be more than a bit overbearing when it came to what he thought was good for her. Maybe she did need to consider cleaning up his circuits a bit. A lovesick tooka, indeed! 

The sound of her noodles boiling over, sizzling and splattering as the water hit the cooktop, snapped Hera back to the moment. She bit back an oath as she grabbed a towel and snatched the pot off the burner. Hot water splashed up onto her wrist; she hissed in pain and frustration. 

Hera leaned against the counter, rubbing the spattering of tiny burns and sighed. Her feelings for Kanan…. How could Chopper possibly know how she felt about Kanan when she wasn’t even sure herself? When they’d met, it had been painfully obvious that he’d been attracted to her, but he’d accepted the fact that she had no time or inclination for relationships at that moment. He’d signed on as part of the _Ghost’s_ crew with that understanding, and it seemed he had moved past the initial attraction as he’d rediscovered his focus as a Jedi. Why that should bother Hera when she had no desire for “attachments” either, she didn’t know—but it did. 

Lately, she’d found herself wondering if Kanan Jarrus wasn’t exactly the kind of man she’d want to have a relationship with if she could—honorable, strong, intelligent, and, yes, handsome, with those smoldering green eyes and the intensity of his oh-so-rare smiles and… And it didn’t matter. He was a Jedi, and Jedi didn’t get emotionally involved. Hera was committed to fighting the Empire, and that didn’t leave any room in her life for matters of the heart, did it?

Right now—Hera shook her head to clear all this nonsense about attachments and entanglements and lovesick tookas from it—right now, it was time to focus on what really mattered. She had dinner to make and a mission to prepare for. Hera picked up her knife and chopped the mushrooms until she’d reduced them all to tiny slivers.


	3. Chapter 3

Moff Ramier’s townhouse was in the heart of Amma, conveniently located near the capital’s theater district, a variety of fine restaurants and—ideally for Kanan and Hera’s purposes—a municipal park. A manicured flower garden at the top of a gently sloping hill overlooked the moff’s residence. From there, they could not only see over his vine-draped privacy fence, but with macrobinoculars, they could look right into the floor-to-ceiling windows of his tastefully appointed conversation circle.

By the time Kanan had finished the task of bugging the Moff’s house—and he didn’t like to think how the Moff had enough money to buy so many paintings—the sun was beginning to set. There was a cool evening breeze blowing when he reached the park; it stirred the flowers, wafting the scent of sweetblossoms through the arboray trees. Hera and Chopper had already taken their stations at the top of the hill. Hera was lying between beds of deep red queen’s heart flowers as she monitored the townhouse below; Chopper was half hidden in a cluster of Ithorian rose bushes, his sensor dish swiveling slowly. 

“Any trouble?” Hera put down her binoculars and looked up as he approached. 

“Nope. A pair of worker’s coveralls and a little _persuasion_...” Kanan moved his right hand in a small arc…”and his aide was all too eager to let me in to repair the moff’s frotzing HoloNet connection.” He crouched down next to her and picked up his own binoculars. “I stashed a couple of listening devices around, in the conversation circle and office.” 

“There are some definite advantages to having you as part of the crew.” There was warm approval in Hera’s voice, and she flashed him a brilliant smile. Kanan felt like he would gladly go back and _persuade_ the Moff to tell him exactly why he was meeting with drug smugglers if it would earn him another smile like that...not that the glow he felt when he saw it was anything other than the warmth of friendly camaraderie. He shifted away from her slightly and checked the settings on his macrobinoculars.

“Chopper, make sure you can pick up the signals from the devices,” Hera instructed the droid. 

“Bwah…” He titled his dish back and forth until a burst of static crackled over his receiver. It resolved into soft strains of music—distinctly amorous music. Kanan recognized the signature bass-baritone voice of the Ithorian singer Bari Viess, from his time tending bar on Gorse; he’d been a favorite of drunk and… over-friendly males who were trying to put the moves on their dates.The Moff crooned along as he poured wine—a nice Corellian red, Kanan noted through his macrobinoculars— just before he opaqued the windows, transforming himself into a mere silhouette. 

Ramier was not a good singer by any Human or near-Human standard... there might have been a species who found flattened tones and strained notes melodious, it was a large Galaxy, after all. Hera winced as he hit a particularly off-key note. “Sounds… good, Chop. Now all we have to do is wait.”

Fortunately, given the Moff’s limited musical abilities, they didn’t have to wait long. He had just finished a particularly labored version of “What’s New, Tooka-kit?” when the door to the conversation circle door swished open and a female Twi’lek with a trim figure and swaying lekku stepped in. “Adila, darling! It’s been too long!” Ramier rushed to embrace her, pulling her into a kiss that would have made even those over-friendly drunkards on Gorse blush. 

Adila finally drew away, laying her hands on Ramier’s shoulders and pushing him back. “It’s only been a week!” she cried with a throaty laugh. 

He pulled her close again, crushing her against him. “A week is too long! A day! An hour!” Each exclamation was punctuated with a kiss, and each kiss was progressively longer and more passionate than the one before. “You can’t keep doing this! Every time you leave, I worry that it will be the last time I see you. Promise me you’ll leave Eighty-seven, Adi!” 

“Yes, love, I promise.” Adila traced a finger down the line of Ramier’s jaw, then leaned forward, nestling her head against his shoulder. “This is the last job. This one makes it all worthwhile and then...then nothing can stop me from being with you.”

“You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting to hear you say that!” Ramier kissed her again, another deep, lingering kiss, their silhouettes melting into each other as they embraced. His hands slid lower and lower as they kissed, and her lekku swayed as they staggered back towards the sofa. Faint gasps, _mmm_ noises and the odd murmur of “oh, Adi…” were the only sounds besides Viess crooning “Amorous Emotions Pervade the Atmosphere” for several minutes.

Watching the shadowy forms of Adila and Ramier locked in passionate embrace, Kanan began to feel uncomfortably warm. This was not something he needed to see. A Jedi should not be spying on such a private moment, but it was like the proverbial repulsor-train wreck—the harder he tried not to look, the more he found himself looking. A Jedi should not be staring, or at the very least, should not view such romantic and physical entanglements as anything...interesting. And that, almost more than the fact he was spying on the couple, made Kanan want to writhe in embarrassment. Because he couldn’t help but notice that Adila Zimin’s silhouette was reminiscent of Hera’s lithe form...and once he’d noticed that, he’d begun to think about her...what it might be like to hold Hera the way Ramier held Adila, to press his lips against hers, to stroke the silken skin of her lekku, and…

Kanan tossed his binoculars down. “Turn it off!” he snapped. “Chopper, turn it off! That’s enough!” The uncomfortable warmth had spread; he was sure his face was now redder than a squashed blumfruit, and he sincerely hoped that Hera had not noticed his reaction. He ventured a glance in her direction...

Hera was laughing. Her eyes sparkled mischievously as she sat up. “Well! I wasn’t expecting that, but I suppose now we know why they’ve been meeting so often!”

He tried to answer, to come up with a clever response, but all that came out was a strangled noise that sounded like, “urrrk!” In his mind’s eye, he pictured her in his arms, smiling at him like that. Kanan scowled; a Jedi should not… 

“Do you really think love is that awful?” Her voice was soft and gentle, but it broke through the wall of should-nots and must-nots he was putting in place between them. There was a certain sadness in her eyes as they met his.

“What? I don’t think…”

“Attachments. Romantic entanglements. When you talk about love, it sounds… painful.” Hera sat back and regarded him pensively. “It’s not always like that, you know. Love can lift you up, not just tie you down and entangle you. Some of the bravest, most selfless acts I saw during the Clone Wars were inspired by love—love for their spouses, their families, their friends. It’s why they were fighting in the first place.”

The Clone Wars… yes, Kanan thought, the war had brought out both the best and worst in people. He remembered how he’d felt when he’d been on Kaller with Master Billaba, Commander Grey, and his troops—Styles, Mixx, Remo...all of them. He’d felt more a part of something than he ever had before. He’d felt connected. It had been a good feeling, one he’d treasured, though Jedi weren’t supposed to hold on to those ties too closely. Now Kanan felt that same sense of belonging with Hera, and he wished the connection could be closer, even though he knew he should not. “The Jedi teach--”

“What about you?”

“What?” Hera’s question caught him off guard. The last time anyone had asked him his feelings about Jedi doctrine had been… Master Billaba on Kaller. 

“You said the Jedi teach, but what do _you_ think?” Hera tilted her head slightly. “Do you think love is only about possession, and jealousy and clouded emotions?”

He was a Jedi; of course he believed the teachings that had been handed down for generations. He was supposed to accept the Council’s will and its words, not to question them. But then, hadn’t Master Billaba always encouraged him to ask questions, to think beyond rote answers? Kanan shifted uneasily, scrubbing a hand over his hair and down to his shoulders. Did he really believe that love could only lead to attachment and from there to darker emotions? Looking into Hera’s eyes—so beautiful, so open and trusting—he didn’t know what to think. But he knew what his heart was starting to believe. 

“I don't know. I think…maybe...with the right person...you could be right,” Kanan stammered, struggling to put this unfamiliar idea into words, to define the way she had made him feel ever since he’d met her. “Love could...inspire you to be better… to do something more with your life than just get by.”

Hera leaned forward. “And what would the right person be like?”

“She…” Kanan faltered. “I guess she’d have to be compassionate… honorable… strong…”

Her lips quirked into a mischievous smile. “Beautiful?”

“It wouldn’t hurt.” Kanan felt himself smiling in answer. Oh yes, beautiful, too, no doubt—a queen among the queen’s heart flowers here in the twilight, as sweet as the scent of blossoms that stirred on the breeze. “But it would be her strength of character that really made her special, that made her the right one.”

“Do you think you’ll ever find anyone like that?”

Did he dare tell her the truth, that every word he’d said had been about her? Did he dare go against everything the Jedi taught about attachments? It was one thing to question, to wonder; another entirely to act on those feelings. Then again, could he keep going this way, living and working alongside Hera everyday but never saying a word about how he felt? He moved closer to her, leaning in. “I think maybe I h—”

“Hey!” The electronically flattened tones of a stormtrooper shattered the fragile stillness of the moment. “You two! What are you doing over there?!”

Kanan had to hand it to Hera—not only was she beautiful, honorable and compassionate, she was absolutely cool under pressure. Without a moment’s hesitation, she snatched up both pairs of macrobinoculars and shoved them as far under the nearest Ithorian rose bush as they would go. Still, they were going to have a hard time coming up with a plausible reason for being in the park after it had closed for the evening. He looked across the flower bed at Hera, who was looking back at him, a question in her eyes—what now? 

He did the only thing he could think of under the circumstances—he pulled Hera towards him and kissed her the way Moff Ramier had kissed Adila.


	4. Chapter 4

This mission had not gone the way that Hera had expected.

She hadn’t expected the reason Moff Ramier was meeting with Adila so frequently was that they were lovers. She hadn’t expected that this sleepy little park would be patrolled by stormtroopers. And she definitely hadn’t expected that Kanan Jarrus would kiss her.

When she’d heard the familiar clomping of plasteel boots heading up the path, Hera had stashed their binoculars as quickly as she could, her brain churning to come up with a plausible reason for being there—Were they gardeners working late? Biologists studying nightwings? Lost tourists? She turned to Kanan…

And suddenly his arms were around her, pulling her towards him. A jolt of surprise shot through her, but before she could even frame the word “what”, his lips were against hers, hesitantly at first, as if he were as surprised he was doing this as she was, but with increasing ardor as he drew her closer, one hand sliding upwards to the base of her neck, the other down to the small of her back, leaning her back among the flower beds. Hera’s surprise melted into acceptance and more than just acceptance; she returned the kiss as eagerly as it was given, her arms twining around Kanan’s neck, pulling him against her. Time slowed, each moment measured in heartbeats, and the world was the warmth of Kanan’s arms around her, the brush of his beard against her (cheek?), the scent of him...

The stormtrooper seemed a very small and faraway concern, at least until the vocoder-processed voice intruded into the enchantment of the moment, “I said, what are you… Oh, I see.” Disgust dripped from the trooper’s voice as he regarded them; good Imperials had small use for alien lovers, particularly when the phrase was literal. “This is a public park, not some kind of….” He broke off with an inarticulate sound of distaste and a curt wave of his gauntleted hand. “Go find yourselves a room. And...er, take your droid with you.”

“Yes, sir,” Hera didn’t have to pretend she was breathless and flustered as Kanan let go of her and she struggled to sit up. “So sorry, sir!” Kanan offered her a hand to help her stand, but didn’t meet her eyes. There were red blotches high on his cheeks and he had the sheepish expression of a youngling caught not just with his hand in the cookie jar but with the jar broken at his feet and crumbs all over his face. He strode briskly out of the park, not looking at the trooper, not looking at Hera, hardly pausing to see if she followed. 

“Kanan, wait!” 

He stopped just outside the park’s gates, shoulders hunched and head down, and his boots seemed to be the most interesting thing in the Galaxy at that moment. “I’m sorry… I shouldn’t have… I…” The normally self-possessed Jedi stammered and stumbled like a droid with a failing vocabulator. “But it was the only thing I could think of.” Kanan’s eyes widened as it hit him what he had said, and he looked like he would gladly pull his own blaster and stun himself with it, if only it would get him out of this conversation. “I mean, the only way to explain what we were doing in the park. I…”

“Is that all it was, then?” Hera’s heart lurched. She’d thought maybe, just maybe, everything he’d said about love, about finding the one who could make it more than just another entanglement meant there was a chink in walls he’d put around his heart. That maybe there was hope… that he could be that one for her and she could be the one for him. “Just an act for the trooper?”

Kanan looked away. “Jedi… can’t…”

Hera’s fragile hope crumbled, crushed like the queen’s heart flowers beneath the stormtrooper’s boots. “Of course not. I’m sorry, too. I should have known.” Heartache bled into her words, and now it was her turn to look away. She pushed past him before he could see… No, those were _not_ tears in her eyes. She would _not_ cry over him. 

“Hera…”

“No, it doesn’t matter. Let’s just get back to the _Ghost_.” Hera kept marching at a pace any parade-ground Imperial would have envied. She would not turn around. She would not let him see that she’d believed his act, that she’d believed _him_. She would never let Kanan Jarrus know that her heart was at his feet. They were colleagues, associates. Nothing more. She’d been a fool to think otherwise. 

——  
Chopper watched Hera storm back to the ship, Kanan trailing in her wake, and sighed in frustration. Organics. He’d never understand the illogical creatures as long as he functioned, and Kanan Jarrus had to be one of the worst for sheer nerf-headed irrationality. Oh, he talked a good game about detachment and not being led by his emotions, but anyone with optical receptors could see detachment was the last thing on his mind when he looked at Hera—and had been ever since he’d set foot on the _Ghost_. 

And Hera...Chopper generally felt she had better judgment than your average organic (she’d had the perspicacity to rescue him, after all), but when it came to Kanan, she’d developed the unfortunate organic habits of ignoring the obvious and pretending that as long as you didn’t say anything, no one could possibly tell how you felt. The two of them had been tiptoeing around the bantha in the room for almost a year now, and it was, in Chopper’s opinion, high time they got on with it and told each other they loved one another already. What in the name of Industrial Automaton were they waiting for? An engraved invitation?

When Kanan had finally—finally!—fumbled and faltered his way towards a confession, Chopper had to keep himself from cheering that it was about karking time! He’d been ready to zap the interfering stormtrooper, but then Kanan had done something truly and wildly illogical: he’d kissed Hera... not just kissed her, but _kissed_ her until she was breathless. Typical meatbag timing on that… While Chopper approved of the kiss itself, he had to wonder why organics seemed incapable of taking decisive action unless they were neck-deep in bantha poodoo. 

But after they’d gotten away from the trooper, Kanan went back to his old ways—Jedi don’t! Jedi can’t! I’m a Jedi so I don’t. Can’t. Never mind what I said and what I did. Jedi! Don’t! Do! Such! Things! Seeing the way Hera closed down at his words, it had taken all Chopper’s willpower not to break out his electroshock attachment and turn in up to eleven on Master Kanan Jarrus‘s shebs. Why couldn’t he just admit that he could and did have feelings for her? That the kiss had been more than just for show? Somehow, for Hera’s sake, Chopper was going to make him do just that.

Clearly, this called for drastic measures.


	5. Chapter 5

The _Ghost_ left Barcana early the next morning. Other than a perfunctory “pass the caf”, Hera hardly spoke to Kanan at breakfast, not even to tell him where they were headed next. She disappeared into the cockpit as soon as she’d gulped down her caf and a ration bar and hadn’t come out since then. 

He couldn’t blame her, Kanan thought morosely, as he stared down at the remaining pieces on the dejarik board. He moved his kintan strider to the inner ring where it flattened the k’lorr slug, and roared in triumph. Having defeated himself soundly for the third time, Kanan switched off the board with a sigh. It was his fault, after all; he should never have let his own emotions and desires get the best of him like that. He hadn’t behaved the way a Jedi should, he hadn’t even acted like a gentleman, taking advantage of their peril to press himself on her. Small wonder she’d been angry at him; he’d hate himself, too, if he were her. 

And yet, a small but insistent corner of his mind whispered, Hera hadn’t seemed upset until he’d walked away and made his fumbling apology. When he’d kissed her, she hadn’t pulled away. She hadn’t slapped him, though she would have been well within her rights to do so. On the contrary, he thought she’d reacted with, well, a certain _interest_ , even enthusiasm, after her initial astonishment when their lips met. He could still feel the touch of her lips warm against his, the softness of her skin, the way she’d melted into his arms— 

No. Kanan stood, shaking his head as if he could clear these alarming, intoxicating thoughts that way. It didn’t matter what he imagined Hera had felt, he was a Jedi, and these kinds of feelings were impossible for him. Attachments were impossible for him; he had to accept that. Hera would come to accept it, too, and they could go back to being the way they had been before: partners and friends, with nothing more needed or wanted. Unless, of course, she threw him off the ship at the next spaceport. Kanan groaned and pushed himself out from behind the dejarik table. Maybe it would be better if he went to his cabin to meditate.

“Bwaaah!” The door to the common area slid open and Chopper wheeled in. Normally, the droid would have joined Kanan for a game of dejarik while the ship was in hyperspace, but today, he’d been conspicuously absent and Kanan could only assume that he shared Hera’s sentiments towards him. “B’bwah bwah bwaah bwop!” he blatted, poking Kanan with one grasper and waving the other forcefully towards the door. “Bwaah BWOP!”

Hera wanted to see him? Kanan’s heart thudded, not knowing whether it should leap or crash at this unexpected news. “Right now?”

“Bwah!” Chopper confirmed. He poked Kanan sharply and prodded him out the door and down the corridor like he was herding a particularly stubborn and stupid nerf. But at least, Kanan reflected as the droid goaded him into the cockpit, he hadn’t broken out his electroshock attachment for the job. He heard an evil snicker behind him as the door swished shut.

Hera was sitting slumped in the captain’s seat, arms crossed over her chest, frowning out at the blue-white swirl of hyperspace. She sat up straight when she heard the door and her mouth flattened into a hard line. She raised an eyebrow at Kanan but said nothing. 

Kanan flashed back to being a youngling in the Jedi Archives, kneeling on his hands and knees on a table, the better to see all of the dozen holobooks spread out in front of him, as Master Nu scowled down at him with exactly the same expression. He tried not to squirm now the way he had then. “You, uh, wanted to see me?”

“No.” Hera turned back to the viewport, eyes resolutely trained forward.

Whatever he’d expected her to say, that wasn’t it. “But Chopper said that you..”

“Well, I don’t.”

“I... I guess… I’ll be going then…” Kanan stammered. He’d expected Hera to be angry and hurt. He’d expected her to shout at him, maybe even curse him. He could have handled that; he deserved it and then some. But this cold indifference, the way she blocked him out refusing to even look at him, felt like a lightsaber to the heart. And he realized too late that by denying his feelings, he hadn’t just squashed whatever might have happened between them, he’d shredded the trust and easy camaraderie that they already had. He didn’t know how—if—he could repair it. How he was going to live without it if he couldn’t, if Hera wouldn’t even let him try. Reluctantly, he turned to leave.

And nearly slammed into the door, which was still closed.

Kanan frowned. He took half a step back and forward again, trying to trigger the door’s motion sensor, but it remained stubbornly shut. He peered at the door frame running his hands along it to see if something had gotten jammed somehow, but found nothing. He stepped back again, waving his hands, hoping that perhaps some more obvious movement would activate the mechanism.

“Is there a problem?” Hera’s tart voice inquired as he went through his nuna-flapping motions for the third time. 

“The door won’t open.” Kanan lowered his arms, feeling like a nerf brain. Could this moment possibly get more awkward? “The sensor must be out.”

Hera made an exasperated sound as she switched to the seat behind the captain’s chair and swiveled to the _Ghost_ ’s main computer terminal. She had just pulled up the ship’s directory when the cockpit lights suddenly flickered and turned off, leaving only the emergency backups on. 

“Wonderful,” she groaned. Her frown deepened as she tapped at the computer’s main menu, to no effect. Hera tapped at the screen again—and again and again with increasing force, until with a hiss of frustration, she flipped on the comm system. “Chopper, what’s going on? Why is my terminal offline? Interface with the main computer and see if there’s some sort of problem with the generator and the central processor. Chopper?”

Static crackled over the intercom for a second, and then--

“Amorous emooootiooons pervaaade the atmosphere ….” The deep bass-baritone voice of the one and only Bari Viess crooned soulfully. “Whichever way I turn my eyestalks… They pervaaaade the atmooooospheeere...”

Hera’s mouth dropped open for a moment, and she spun towards Kanan, glaring vibro-shivs at him, her expression daring him to laugh. Or speak. Or even breath loudly. He held up his hands, palms out, and shook his head. Whatever was going on here, it was none of his doing. For one thing, if he was going to have Chopper broadcast romantic music, he would have chosen something besides Bari Viess.

She whirled back to the comm station with a scowl and jabbed the switch. “Chopper!! This isn’t funny!”

The droid apparently thought so, though; there was a distinctly smug chuckling to his answer. “Bwah! Bwah bwop b’bwaah bwahbwaah bwah _bwop_ b’bwop!”

“Why you…!” Hera exclaimed, her cheeks flushing, though Kanan couldn’t tell whether it was from embarrassment, anger or a little of both. Her presence in the Force was such a churning tangle that he couldn’t even discern the individual strands of emotion that swirled through it.

“What did he say?” The droid’s vocalizations had been too rapid for Kanan to catch most of what he’d said, but from the look on Hera’s face, he doubted he was going to like it any more than she had. Chopper’s sense of humor ranged from the mildly obnoxious to the downright vile.

Hera’s lekku twitched spasmodically. “He says he’s keeping us in here until, and I quote ‘we kiss and make up.’”

“That’s just a figure of speech, though, right?” That didn’t seem so bad. Kanan was all for making up; he’d apologize as abjectly as he had to to make things right with Hera. He didn’t see why Chopper thought all this rigmarole was necessary to get that to happen, though. Locking them in...well, all right, Hera didn’t seem inclined to talk to him otherwise, but lowering the lights and playing sappy love songs? Surely that was a bit much.

“Bwahahaha!” Hearty electronic laughter pealed over the comm. “Bwah! Bwaah bwabwaah bwop!” 

“No. He’s being literal.” Hera flipped every switch and turned all the knobs on the control panel in growing annoyance as Chopper continued his smug lecture in Binary. “He adds that since he’s a droid, he doesn’t need to eat or use the fresher, but eventually we will. So we’d better get to… Cee-One-Ten-Pee, I am _not_ repeating that!” Her already flushed face mottled the color of an overripe meiloorun. She leaned towards the comm speaker like she wished she could reach through it and deactivate a certain trying astromech. “When I get out of here… yes, thank you for reminding me that you’re in control of the cabin door!” 

“I could use my lightsaber…” Kanan offered. The cockpit door wasn’t nearly as thick as a Star Destroyer’s double shielded blast door; it would only be a few minutes’ work to slice their way through.

Hera shot a pointed look over her shoulder at him. “And damage my ship?! I don’t think so! Ugh… he’s got me completely locked out!” She smacked her hands against the terminal and pushed herself back into her chair. “You are so getting your circuits wiped for this!” she shouted, pointing an accusatory finger at the intercom.

“There is an easy way out of this, you know.” He was surprised she hadn’t already seen it. “We could just give him what he wants…”

“What he wants?”

“Yes, you know, just to get him to open the door…” It wouldn’t have to be like last night’s kiss, when he’d let himself get carried away by the feel of Hera’s sensual lips, the warmth of her body pressed against his, her rising ardor as they… Kanan squashed down that memory before it could become too tempting. This would be nothing like that. One quick kiss. A peck on the cheek, even, if Chopper would accept that. Friendly. Collegial. Apologetic. Nothing more. 

“Mmh-hmm.” Hera crossed her arms over her chest, her expression frosty and her lips in a decidedly un-sensual line. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” It was a perfectly reasonable suggestion, after all. As reasonable as you could be when you were dealing with irrational droids whose personality matrices needed a major overhaul.

“To get Chopper to open the door. To fool the stormtrooper.” Hera sprang up from her seat and jabbed a finger into the center of his chest. “Are you ever going to kiss me for real?!”

“What?” Kanan took a step back, startled by her vehemence. Her voice was raw with all the hurt she’d held back before, but there was a strange note of longing behind it, a longing that was reflected in her eyes when they met his. A longing that matched his own for her. _Yes!_ part of him responded. _Kiss her—_ reaIly kiss her! Do it now! “I…” _You can’t,_ another part admonished. _You’re a Jedi. You know you can’t._. “Jedi…”

“No! I don’t want to hear what Jedi do or don’t do!” Hera cried, her eyes flashing. For a moment, Kanan thought he saw the gleam of tears in them. But it must have been a trick of the dim lighting, because the next moment, she prodded him hard in the sternum again. “Tell me that _you_ , Kanan Jarrus, don’t want to kiss me, that you didn’t mean anything by what happened last night and I’ll never bring it up again.Tell me you regret it, and I’ll find a way to jerry-rig the door and we can get on with our lives.”

Kanan hesitated. He knew that he should tell her; it would be better for them both that way. He was a Jedi and attachments were forbidden to him. He had to let her go, to let her find someone who could love her the way she deserved to be loved.

But he hesitated. Because if he was honest with himself, he wanted to kiss Hera, and he wanted it more than he’d wanted anything for a very long time. How could just let her go? If he was still a Jedi at all, it was only because her idealism had reawakened that side of him. She’d reminded him what it was like to have a purpose, to be part of a team, and to fight for something bigger than himself. Without her, he might as well still be that aimless drifter, living just to stay one step ahead of the Empire. He didn’t want to be that man again, and he didn’t want to live without Hera. There was no use denying it any longer.

“I can’t,” Kanan sighed. “The only thing I regret is that I was too much of a coward to be honest with you. It’s not easy for me to admit it, even to myself.” How could he explain it to her, when he was still trying to understand it all? “I was raised with the idea that Jedi control our emotions,” he said, and somehow it was easier to address this explanation to a scuff mark near his left boot. “We don’t have relationships. We don’t seek them. We don’t need them or want them, not the way other beings do. But, well, I guess I was never very good at that part of it because I do… I just… “ He shook his head. “I don’t know how to feel this way.”

“And you think I do?” 

“You?” Kanan’s head snapped up. The gentleness in Hera’s voice surprised him nearly as much as the idea that she could be as unsettled by these feelings as he was. “But you’re…. You’re beautiful, Hera. Amazing. There must have been lots of men who…”

“If they did, I never knew it,” she said with a tiny, rueful laugh. “You grew up in a temple, but I grew up on a battlefield, the revolutionary’s daughter. It puts a bit of distance between you and your peers when there are songs about your father’s exploits.” Hera paused, gazing out at the whirling streaks of hyperspace for a long moment before continuing with a sigh. “And after I left Ryloth I didn’t have relationships, I had a cause. I didn’t think I had time or room in my life for anything else. I didn’t think I needed anything else, but I do.” A wistful smile played at the corners of her lips, and she spread her hands. “So you see, I’m not really sure how to feel this way, either.” 

Bari Viess’s baritone thrumming “Every image, every tooooone..They pervaaade the atmooooospheeeeere…” was the only sound in the cockpit as Kanan considered these unexpected revelations. Hera so rarely spoke of her past that he’d never thought of what being Cham Syndulla’s daughter must have been like for her. In some ways, it must have been more like his boyhood as a Jedi initiate than any sort of typical childhood. Both of them had been raised with their needs secondary to the greater good. They’d been taught the importance of duty, justice, and freedom. 

And now, here they were, both struggling with these unfamiliar emotions, wondering how to reconcile their commitment to fighting the Empire with their need for the kind of love that would make all the fighting worthwhile. 

“I don’t knooooow if I’m fooooolish,” Bari sang. “Don’t knooooow if I’m beeeing wiiiise…”

Kanan didn’t know if what he felt was wise, either. He only knew that he was wiser, better, more _whole_ with Hera than he had been without her. He reached out to her. “Maybe we could figure things out together.”

“Maybe we could,” Hera whispered, reaching back.

He stepped towards her, closing the gap between them. “Then I guess there’s just one thing left to do.” 

“Oh? What’s that?”

“For real this time…” Kanan said, and he kissed her.

There was an ineffable sweetness to their kiss knowing that Hera was experiencing the same exhilarating astonishment that he was, and a reassurance in the knowledge that whatever hopes and doubts he had, she had, too. And when the kiss deepened from a gentle brush of lips into something more ardent, it wasn’t that they were surrendering to their emotions so much as acknowledging what had been growing between them all along. 

Whether this was wise or whether it was foolish, only time would tell, but this moment, with Hera in his arms and her lips pressed against his, felt incredibly _right_ and definitely _real_ to Kanan, beyond any shadow of a doubt.

Neither of them heard the click of the cabin door unlocking… or the satisfied chuckle of a very smug astromech.   
———

Chopper congratulated himself as he unplugged from the main processor’s interface. His plan had succeeded admirably—of course. Organics could be so predictable at times. All you had to do was apply the right stimuli to get the chemicals flowing in those squishy meatbags they called bodies and the rest would take care of itself. And speaking of proper stimuli—he decided to leave the cockpit’s lighting dim and let the “Bari Viess’s Greatest Hits” compilation he’d pulled off the holonet keep playing. Though things seemed to be proceeding nicely—Kanan and Hera were still kissing and showed no inclination of stopping—these two were more stubborn than most organics and needed all the help they could get in navigating the arbitrary set of emotions and bio-physical reactions meatbags termed “love”.

It was lucky for them that they had him around.


End file.
